| Popis: |
NASA is considering a second series of handheld test vessels to further study important characteristics of low-g capillary flows aboard the International Space Station (ISS). These Capillary Flow Experiments (CFE-2) consists of eleven (< 1.5kg) test vessels designed to probe certain capillary phenomena of fundamental and applied importance such as: critical wetting in discontinuous structures and surfaces, capillary flows in complex containers, and passive gas-liquid phase separations. Highly quantitative video images from the simplyperformed experiments are expected to provide immediate confirmation of, and guidance for, current analytical and numerical design tools for the development of advanced fluid systems aboard spacecraft. Four of the eleven vessels proposed require simple, quick and low cost adaptations to existing flight hardware. The remaining units require new builds. All of the experiments contain small volumes of zero hazard fluids, require no electrical interface, minimal crew training, and may be conducted in the open at any location aboard the ISS. |
